Paper Mill Playhouse Announces 2023-2024 Season
Paper Mill Playhouse, recipient of the 2016 Regional Theatre Tony Award, has announced its 2023–2024 season of five musicals, including a world premiere, a Tony Award winner, and an electrifying new musical inspired by real events in post-emancipation Texas.
Paper Mill Playhouse’s 2023–2024 lineup features The Great Gatsby (Oct 12–Nov 12, 2023), Fiddler on the Roof (Dec 6, 2023–Jan 7, 2024), After Midnight (Jan 31–Feb 25, 2024), Gun & Powder (Apr 4–May 5, 2024), and Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (June 5–30, 2024).
“We are thrilled to invite audiences to experience the variety of musicals that Paper Mill Playhouse has to offer in its 85th season,” said Mark S. Hoebee (Producing Artistic Director).
Paper Mill Playhouse's 85th season kicks off with the world premiere of the musical,The Great Gatsby. Set in the Roaring Twenties, the story follows eccentric and mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby, who will stop at nothing in the pursuit of the lost love of his youth, Daisy Buchanan. Through its fascinatingly nuanced characters, driven by complex inner lives—with passions and longings that boil, and then erupt—The Great Gatsby has always been destined to sing. Featuring an electrifying jazz and pop-infused score written by Tony Award nominees Nathan Tysen (Paradise Square) & Jason Howland (Beautiful: The Carole King Musical – Grammy Award winner), a book by Kait Kerrigan (The Mad Ones), and direction by Marc Bruni (Beautiful: The Carole King Musical), this world premiere musical is set to roar The Great Gatsby into the 21st century.
The holiday season will feature the beloved classic, Fiddler on the Roof. The Tony Award–winning musical is set in a Russian village in the home of Tevye, a Jewish husband and father striving to uphold his family’s religious and cultural traditions. Directed by Paper Mill Producing Artistic Director Mark S. Hoebee with the original choreography of Jerome Robbins, Fiddler on the Roof’s timeless score includes such favorites as “Tradition,” “Matchmaker, Matchmaker,” “If I Were a Rich Man,” “To Life (L’Chaim!),” and “Sunrise, Sunset.”
Leading us into 2024 is After Midnight. This electrifying musical revue transports you to the Cotton Club of the Harlem Renaissance, an unparalleled time in New York City when jazz and swing were king. After Midnight intertwines the poetry of Langston Hughes with songs from big-band legends Duke Ellington, Jimmy McHugh, Harold Arlen, Dorothy Fields, and more. The exhilarating set list features such hits as “I Can’t Give You Anything but Love,” “Stormy Weather,” “On the Sunny Side of the Street,” and “It Don’t Mean a Thing.”
April brings Gun and Powder, a new musical inspired by the true story of Mary and Martha Clarke, African American twin sisters who take extraordinary measures to settle their mother’s sharecropper debt and save her home. In 1893 Texas, the Sisters Clarke—passing as white—embark on a remarkable Wild West adventure that examines race, family, and identity with two electrifying women who transformed from farm girls to outlaws to legends. Featuring book and lyrics by Angelica Chéri (a real-life descendant of Mary and Martha Clarke), music by Ross Baum, and direction by Obie winner Stevie Walker-Webb (Ain’t No Mo’). This production is in association with P3 Productions.
And kicking off the summer is Beautiful! This Tony-nominated musical follows the early life and career of Carole King on her journey from teenage songwriter to chart-topping solo artist. King wrote for many of the biggest names in music, often alongside her husband, but it wasn’t until she made the leap from the writer’s room to the stage that she truly found her voice. This inspiring story of love, heartbreak, and empowerment features over two dozen hits, including “One Fine Day,” “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” and “Natural Woman.” Casey Hushion (Clue, A Jolly Holiday) returns to direct.
For more information, visit https://papermill.org/
